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“Ensign, everything’s going to be okay,” Giotto said. “The captain’s here.”

Much to his surprise, McCoy found himself wishing Spock was aboard. The Vulcan could have mind-melded with the comatose patients.

The doctor spent half an hour running simulations, trying to determine the best way to reach the coma patients. McCoy believed if he was awake when he took the stimulant, he’d simply see more hallucinations. If he was unconscious, he wouldn’t be able to control what happened. The computer confirmed that putting his brain into a heightened state while deprived of outside stimuli was the best way.

When McCoy told Uhura what he planned to do and why, she was stunned. “You’re telling me the medical staff has been seeing hallucinations, caused by the comatose espers. And your solution is to place yourself in a coma to find out why, thereby removing the only doctor the Enterprise has?”

“Uhura, I believe that they are trying to tell us how to free the ship, but I’m too distant. This way I go to the source.”

The lieutenant studied McCoy, shaking her head, finally saying, “Permission granted.” Before McCoy could leave his transformed lab, she added, “Leonard, this better work. I’ll never forgive you if it doesn’t.”

“I’ll be fine.” McCoy turned and headed to the ward.

“Here’s your chance to get away from it all,” Jocelyn said pointedly. “Talk about duty in the far-off reaches. Are you looking to kill yourself? That’s certainly going further than anyone has ever gone before. And if you don’t come back—oh, well.”

“Jocelyn, I have to.”

“You ‘have to’ do this, don’t you, Dad?” Joanna asked. “Just like you ‘had to’ leave me on Cerberus. How convenient that all the things you ‘have to’ do let you abandon your responsibility.”

McCoy was stung, because there was a kernel of truth in what they said. It wasn’t the first time he’d volunteered for an incredibly dangerous mission.

He was lying on a biobed, one over from Salah. The medical computer had suggested that proximity would be best.

“Are you done yet, Nurse?” he asked.

Chapel was adjusting the bed’s monitors, taking far too long. “Almost, Doctor. We can’t be too careful.”

McCoy shifted uncomfortably. Was it just him, or had the beds gotten harder? Maybe he was just tense.

“Is this really you? The Leonard I know gave up when things got difficult,” muttered Jocelyn, somewhere to his left, but out of sight.

“Is it impossible to imagine that I’ve changed?” he snapped.

Chapel looked startled. “Was that—”

“Yes,” he said. “Sorry. Sometimes I forgot they’re not really here.”

Chapel adjusted the controls. “We’re set, Doctor.”

“About damn time,” muttered McCoy. “You’ll need to knock me out with sonambutril first—”

“I was paying attention when we rehearsed this five minutes ago, Doctor.” Chapel was on edge, but then they all were.

McCoy stared up at Chapel, who was holding a hypo-spray in her hands. “Would you do me a favor, Christine? In addition to the one you’re doing me right now, I mean?”

“Of course, Doctor. What is it?”

“Sulu,” he said. “Check up on him, will you? We need all the senior staff we can get, and unless he’s falling over, release him for duty.”

“I’ll do that,” Chapel said. “Now, are you ready?”

Was he? Was he ready to have his mind plunged into who-knows-where to try to contact people they weren’t sure were looking for help?

“That’s right, son. Run away from it all again.”

Hell, yes—he was ready. “Put me under.”

“Here we go.” Chapel took one last look at the monitors, then plunged the hypospray into McCoy’s upper arm.

Relief flooded through McCoy’s body, penetrating every organ. He felt himself relax, truly relax, for the first time in weeks. “Well, I’ll be. This is almost better than—”

FOURTEEN

Stardate Unknown“

—better than a mint julep.”

McCoy looked around him. He was standing in the waiting room of a doctor’s office. Garishly colored plastic chairs all around him, a pile of data slates on a table, no doubt containing out-of-date downloads.

Wait